A New Flight Path for Wings

I was reading something that
stopped me cold the other day – or stopped me hot, to be more precise. The
least expensive part of any chicken, the part producers could barely give away a
mere half-century ago, has become the single most expensive part.

That, just in time for July 4th,
is the mystery and miracle of the chicken wing.

Sometimes it feels like chicken
wings – the first time I heard of them, they were called “buffalo wings,”
though even I was smart enough to know buffalos didn’t have wings – are the
things that keep all-American sports bars in business, even more than sports.
And between the wings-centric chains like Buffalo Wild Wings (or BW3, in my
kids’ lingo, for reasons I’ll explain) and the populist menus at Applebee’s,
TGIFridays and the like, chicken wings do tend to be everywhere we look.

Even pizza-centric concepts like
Domino’s and Pizza Hut do a brisk business in the silly things, especially as
each of the most popular sports moves into the playoff phase of its season.
These days even soccer’s World Cup, long a huge deal everywhere but here, is
likely to inspire millions of Americans to “take wing.”

As many have figured out by now,
“Buffalo” in the context of chicken wings isn’t an animal wandering the Great
Plains but a city in Upstate New York. And the wings in questions started out
not as a recipe but a mistake.

Teressa Bellissimo (an Italian
family name meaning “most beautiful,” no less) must have slipped up on the
phone with her chicken guy, ordering chicken wings instead of the chicken necks
her husband Frank used to make their “red gravy” for spaghetti. Since they’d
both run the Anchor Bar in Buffalo since 1939 and it was now 1964, she figured
she could call they guy back and, even if he grumbled a little, he’d come
replace the wings with necks in the name of customer service.

Frank, however, told his wife not
to bother: Just make something to give away to drinkers at the bar. Looking for
the easiest way to get from Point A to Point B, and probably grumbling a little
herself, Teressa deep-fried the wings without bothering to make a batter,
doused them in hot sauce and served them with celery and blue cheese salad
dressing.

People liked it. No, make that:
People loved it. The Anchor being a bar, the Bellissimos initially loved that
their “Buffalo wings” were hot enough with sauce to make people drink more.
Eventually, people came to drink at the Anchor Bar BECAUSE it was Home of the
Original Buffalo Wings.

The spread of wings was about
what you’d expect, starting with other bars around Buffalo that felt they had
to compete, and then with bars across “Upstate” (saying New York is unnecessary
among the locals). As always, there came to be fan clubs that figured their
favorite bar made wings even better than the Anchor, Duff’s being the
best-known – if very local – example. People don’t go out for “Duff Wings,” now
do they?

Calvin Trillin, the beloved
journalist who called himself a “big hungry boy” in books like “Alice, Let’s
Eat,” went to Buffalo to track down the story in 1980. And when Hooters debuted
three years later, chicken wings were the heart of its menu.

By the way, the original name of
Buffalo Wild Wings was “Buffalo Wild Wings & Weck,” a reference to a
Buffalo-beloved beef sandwich served on a German roll called “kummelweck.” Beef
on Weck, this sandwich was called. According to all credible stories, the 19th-century
bread became a fixture in Buffalo’s bars because it was sprinkled with caraway
seeds and salt – and therefore caused bar patrons to drink more.

The “Weck” proved too local a
reference and fell out of the Buffalo Wild Wings name – except for insiders who
still call the place “BW3” – but I think we’re seeing a theme here.

SMOKED CHAMPAGNE HONEY MUSTARD
WINGS

One key to the original
popularity of “Buffalo wings” was the hot sauce that kept bar patrons drinking.
We like hot sauce as much as the next red-blooded American, but we know there’s
other interesting and soul-satisfying things to do with a chicken wing. The
next time you want to pull out the smoker, here’s a notion that might not have
crossed your mind.

While wings are smoking, prepare the sauce by stirring together the mustard, brown sugar, vinegar, garlic powder and Worcestershire. Remove the wings from the smoker, toss with the sauce and sprinkle with crushed pretzels and more black pepper. Serves 4-6.